


Focused Recreation: Present-moment, Mind-Body Activities and PTSD Therapy For Veterans

by Skeiler



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Gen, Knitting, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Revenge By Crafting, Therapy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-20
Updated: 2015-03-20
Packaged: 2018-03-18 19:03:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 537
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3580476
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skeiler/pseuds/Skeiler
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam Wilson, VA counselor and friend of supersoldiers, decides to help James Barnes with his PTSD.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Focused Recreation: Present-moment, Mind-Body Activities and PTSD Therapy For Veterans

**Author's Note:**

  * For [often_adamanta](https://archiveofourown.org/users/often_adamanta/gifts).



Sam Wilson had given Barnes his first pair of knitting needles. They were bright red metal with silver caps, and the sound that they made when they slid along the surface of his metal hand made Barnes wince. They were difficult to hold, so Sam had come back the next day with colorful purple and green rubber coils that made it easier for Barnes to grip them.

“Focused recreation,” Sam explained as he set an open book on the kitchen table in front of Barnes. The page it was opened to had pictures of women, babies, and small dogs wearing knitted hats and scarves in bright colors. Barnes looked at it suspiciously, a spoonful of oatmeal suspended halfway between his bowl and his mouth. Sam continued, “The idea is that you do something that requires you to focus on what you’re doing—to be really present in the moment. You accomplish little things, you feel positive about them, and you suffer fewer symptoms of PTSD.”

Barnes glanced from the book to Sam’s face, then to where Steve was lurking in the kitchen behind the coffeemaker. “Okay.”

“Plus you get to make all your friends hats.”

“Okay,” Barnes repeated. “Can I finish my breakfast first?”

The next few weeks didn’t go as Sam Wilson had probably intended. Barnes felt silly trying to maneuver the needles, especially given how hard it was for him to keep any part of his body still for longer than it took to shovel food into his mouth or shave. He managed to tie his hands up in knots several times, each of these episodes ending in his snapping a needle in half with his metal hand. Steve covertly ordered an entire case of them from Amazon and kept silently replacing the broken ones when Barnes wasn’t looking. By the end of the second week, Barnes had one small, misshapen square and about seventeen miles of knotted yarn strewn around his bedroom.

By the end of the third week he had a long rectangle.

By the end of the fourth he’d managed something that could have been a very long, thin scarf or a dog leash, and he’d gone five days without breaking a needle. He’d also stopped snapping at Steve or Sam when they tried to tell him what a good job he was doing—he could see the forty-seven knots in the stupid thing, and their praise felt patronizing.

By the end of the fifth week he’d managed to create a functional scarf, the finishing of which made him realize he’d spent several hours working on it without fidgeting, punching anything, breaking anything, or remembering to feel guilty about his career as a brainwashed super-assassin. He hung the scarf on a peg in his closet and hit the Internet to find a new pattern.

By the end of the sixth week Steve Rogers and Sam Wilson were mildly regretting their focused recreation therapy conspiracy as Barnes stuck a third be-pommed hat in neon bright colors on Sam’s head to complement the two scarves he’d wrapped around Sam’s neck.

“Thank you,” Sam muffled through the layers of scarf. “Very kind of you.”

Barnes just smiled at him, and somehow that made everything worse.


End file.
